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Wednesday, November 28, 2012

It has been a busy few days in Kindergarten Plus. It is hard to believe we have already been in school for 55 days. I am amazed at how much we are learning and how enthusiastic these students are about school. They love to learn!

In the mornings, one of our jobs is to sign up for milk if we want to have it at snack time. For morning work we sometimes do our fine motor tubs or we have worksheets to do. Today we had an addition worksheet. We are learning about number sentences and how to write them, too.

We were able to do a few Guided Reading groups this morning. While Mrs. Kurt taught the reading groups, the rest of us worked on our Math Workplaces. One of our groups made some pretty sweet pattern block pictures.

We had Mix It Up Math today. In Mrs. Kurt's group, we worked on a new activity called "What Comes Next?" We rolled a die and wrote down the number that we rolled. Then we wrote down the three numbers that come next, or follow the number we rolled.

In Math, we reviewed the workplace called Count and Compare Butterflies. Our guest teacher, Mrs. Peterson, introduced it to us yesterday. This activity focuses on the concepts of "more" and "less". We also did some work with measurement. Mrs. Kurt had several pieces of yarn of varying lengths in paper bags. Each group had a bag and had to work together to observe and compare the pieces of yarn. We used words like shorter, longer, the same, shortest and longest to describe the yarn. Tomorrow we will complete an activity where we estimate the length of something. Look for photos of that tomorrow!

Our Social Studies lesson today focused on the city and state that we live in. We talked about the things that make our cities special and why we like living here. We are busy working on a booklet about where we are in the world.

Monday, November 26, 2012

This afternoon we started a new unit in Social Studies called "Where Am I In The World?" In this unit we will be learning that we are part of a family, a neighborhood, a city, a state, a country and the world.

Today we discussed where we live. Some of the responses included: in a blue house; in a wood house; in Minnesota; in Eagan; on Northview Terrace Road just to name a few. We discovered that all of these responses were actually correct.

Next we learned a song called "I Know Where I Live" and sang along.

Then we read and discussed the big book pages to go with the chapter. Look for our packet to go with this unit coming home at the end of the week.

Today was our first day of really cold temperatures at recess. As you can see, there were lots of rosy, red cheeks when we came in.

Please be sure your child has the appropriate winter wear for outdoor recess. We are usually outdoors for 25 minutes and it can get pretty cold.

Tinker toys and legos continue to be some of the most popular choices during Free Choice time!

We went to the computer lab again today to continue working on Math in Education City. We had a great day!

Wednesday, November 21, 2012

We started out the day making our turkey hats. We had to be sure we decorated them exactly the same on both sides. We could not wait to finish them so we could wear them. Don't we look cute?

Mrs. Kurt read us the story "Twas the Night Before Thanksgiving" by Dav Pilkey.

In this story, some students on a field trip to a local farm discover that the eight turkeys they have been playing with are going to be tomorrow's Thanksgiving dinner! As you might imagine, the students were really upset by this so the farmer and the teacher ran to get them water from the well to calm them down. When they returned with the water, they noticed that the students were quiet and noticeably plumper. That's because the kids hid the turkeys in their shirts and waddled back on the bus to take the turkeys home. Instead of being Thanksgiving dinner, the turkeys were at Thanksgiving dinner and they were thankful!

We discussed what we could do to save a turkey, like eat more stuffing or pumpkin pie or mac and cheese. After brainstorming a list, we completed our latest turkey project on how we would save a turkey. We also made ABC patterns with the turkey's tail feathers. We are pretty proud of our work!

We've been singing a few Thanksgiving songs. Here are the words:

Five Fat Turkeys

Five fat turkeys are we.
We slept all night in a tree.
When the cooks came around
we couldn't be found.
So that's why we're here, you see!

Turkey Dinner
Turkey dinner. Turkey dinner.
Pumpkin pie. One foot high.
All of us were thinner
until we came to dinner!
Yum! Yum! Yum!

The Turkey is a Funny Bird
The turkey is a funny bird.
His head goes wobble - wobble.
And all he says is just one word...
Gobble! Gobble! Gobble!

Ask your child to sing these for you. I think you'll enjoy them!

Granny Goose visited today. She read us the story "Arthur's Halloween".

We hope you all have a Happy Thanksgiving. Enjoy time with your family and friends. We decided today that we have lots to be thankful for!

Tuesday, November 20, 2012

We completed our Turkey Math project today. We looked at the number and colors of the feathers we used and made number sentences using this information. They turned our pretty cute!

We were able to get through a few more guided reading groups today. We are working on pointing to each word as we read them and using our strategies to figure out new words. For example, looking at the picture clues, looking at the first letter of a word and getting our mouth ready to make that sound, or checking to see if the word makes sense just to name a few.

We talked about things that we are thankful for and we wrote about them in computer lab today. It was a good day. Tomorrow will be fun, too. Lots of Thanksgiving activities to look forward to!

Monday, November 19, 2012

Meet our new friend, Madi. Today was her first day in Kindergarten Plus and it went very well. We are all so excited that Madi is a part of our class. Please join us in welcoming Madi and her family to Kindergarten Plus at Northview!

We started our Guided Reading groups today and we are super excited about this! When a guided reading group meets, we read through the book and send it home. These books will come home in large ziploc bags with pink papers inside. Please have your child read through the book at least three times and sign the reading log. New books cannot be sent home until the previous one is returned. We will typically have Reading Workshop on Thursdays and Fridays, which is when we will have guided reading groups. However, we may have it on other days, especially when we have a week with no school on Thursday or Friday. Please let Mrs. Kurt know if you have any questions on how this will work.

We started making our Math turkeys this afternoon. Tune in to the blog tomorrow to see the finished product!

At the end of each school day, we have a tradition in our classroom called Appreciation Circle. We meet as a group by Mrs. Kurt's rocking chair and each of us tells something that we appreciated about our day. This helps us to end our day on a positive note as well. Today some of the things we appreciated were choice time, Music class, meeting a new friend, playing with friends on the playground and many others.

Friday, November 16, 2012

We finished (and delivered) our service project for the Augustana Emerald Crest Memory Care Unit in Burnsville. We made placemats for their Thanksgiving dinner. We made hand print turkeys, added details and colored in the background. It was a good experience for us to do something for others.

We also finished our patchwork quilt that we created for Math. When it was all done, we could not believe how many patterns we were able to find in the quilt! We hung it up in the hallway and next week we plan to write about it. We learned how important it was to work together to finish this project.

We made special handprint turkeys to go with a Thanksgiving poem. Today we added the details and hopefully you found it in your child's Friday Folder.

We also had to say good bye to a good friend. Danica and her family are moving to Texas. Although we haven't known each other that long, we are all going to miss Danica, her big smile and her excitement to learn. We made her a special book to take along and put our pictures in it so she could remember us. We wish Danica and her family the best as they start this new adventure in their lives. Keep in touch!